"And when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done is secret, will reward you……"Matthew 6:6

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Along came a spider

I was driving home a couple of weeks ago when it finally happened. The thing I always dreaded. The “what would I do if this happened scenario.” I was talking to my Dad on the commute home when I noticed something in my peripheral vision……a movement. Say it isn’t so. But there it was, skittering across the dash like it owned the place. A spider. Everyone who knows me knows how I feel about them.

I know they are God’s creatures. I know they are good to have around…..as long as they remember their place…..outside. I know they eat flies and other pests, and that their webs are works of art, especially when hit with morning dew. I really can see the beauty in that. But where there’s a web there’s an occupant. There it is, smack dab in the middle of that glorious creation…….along with all eight creepy legs that I imagine crawling across my face in the middle of the night.

That actually happened to me once and I never forgot it.

Surprisingly, Charlotte’s Web was my favorite book growing up, but no matter how my Dad tried to tell me to “let Charlotte live” it didn’t matter. It only pulled on my heartstrings for a second…..right before I switched on the vacuum cleaner and sucked Charlotte right into her new forever home.

There it was, dangerously close, on my side of the dash. I held my breath and leaned over as far as I could toward the passenger side. Then it leisurely went across to the other side….I released my breath. It was tortuous. I thought it would help if I stayed on the phone and so I did, never letting the panic hit my voice. I was extremely proud of myself for exercising such supreme discipline and control.

That is, until it started to crawl, in that fast creepy way they have, right over to where I was sitting. Trapped. My hands gripped the wheel and did the only thing I could do.

I sped up.

Then the worst happened, it disappeared! I lost track of the sucker. Any minute I expected it to float down right in front of my face. The not knowing was worse than actually seeing it.

It appeared again by my left shoulder. That’s when all my self control and discipline went out the window. By the time I approached the Wal-Mart off-ramp I was approaching 80 MPH. I was in complete control of course, my hands never left the wheel except for once.

I barrelled around the corner and screeched to a stop in the garden center parking lot. By that time it had managed to make it all the way to the backseat floorboards. I should have let it go but I didn’t. I got a towel from the trunk and smashed it good.

I feel bad for killing one of God’s creatures….

If it just hadn’t been in my car.

Later I told my Dad about it. After the laughter subsided he told me he was impressed by my tremendous display of self discipline.

I wouldn't have lasted that long. I would have pulled over and sought that sucker and then spent a good thirty minutes trying to figure out how to kill it or looking for a hero to do it for me. Eventually, i would have just abandoned my errand that day because by the time I actually did kill it the day would have been done. My opinion of spider killing: the more the better. If they violate the human-spider treaty of 1706 and dare to invade a human home, well, it's war.